


The Protector

by PlatformNineAndThreeQuarters



Category: Naruto
Genre: Fix-It, Gen, Second Shinobi War, Self-Insert
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-17
Updated: 2020-07-09
Packaged: 2021-03-01 01:21:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,054
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23186950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PlatformNineAndThreeQuarters/pseuds/PlatformNineAndThreeQuarters
Summary: Without the rose tinted glasses of childhood, Narutoverse is a horrible and dangerous world to be reincarnated in.I suppose I could run away from Konoha to start a safer, civilian life. It would certainly be easier to survive that way.But is survival enough?
Comments: 8
Kudos: 215
Collections: A Collection of Beloved Inserts





	1. Chapter 1

For someone who took pride in their intelligence, it took an embarrassingly long time for me to realise that I had been reincarnated into Narutoverse and that my parents weren't anime obsessed cosplayers.

Sure, being reincarnated was a strange experience. After months of being suspended in amniotic fluid, being pushed through the birth canal and realising that I was a baby, my first few weeks of life were spent recovering from the trauma.

It took me about a month to realise that the two big blobs that were my parents were actually Nara Himiko and Nara Shota. The smaller blob that I was pretty sure was my elder sibling was Shikaku Nara. As I had seen the Mount Rushmore type thing that was definitely the Hokage mountain (though I wasn't able to see the number of head due to my poor eyesight), I realised that I was in the era after the founding of Konoha. And the only Shikaku Nara I had read about during this era was Shikamaru's father, I was able to tentatively place myself in the same generation as Minato and Kushina. Which meant that there were three highly dangerous Great Shinobi Wars were yet to happen, in which I had very high chances of dying.

This realisation led to an intense bout of crying which led to me exhausting myself to sleep, due to my highly emotional and fragile infant body.

I had considerably calmed down after my nap and was able to think more clearly. There were many ways following which I could completely avoid the wars and live a safe and violence free civilian life, either in Konoha or somewhere else. I could run away, or pretend to be not be able to use chakra (which I could feel running beneath my skin even as a baby), or fail the Shinobi academy and end up as a desk ninja. There was no need to be involved in the canon events. Everything had turned out fine in the end, didn't it? With Naruto as the seventh Hokage and peace in the Elemental Nations.

But I had already lived my safe and violence free civilian life. This was my second chance. If I was not supposed to be involved, why was I even reincarnated in this world with my memory intact? I was not delusional. Being reincarnated did not give me plot armor. There was a very high probability of me dying if I try to change the timeline, or heck even become a ninja. But I had already lived a life, hadn't I? Granted it wasn't as long as I would have liked it to be, but this was my second chance. I could spend it trying to survive in this harsh, dangerous world, or try to change it.

At the end it wasn't that hard if a decision. To borrow from Harry Potter, 'I always had a saving people thing.'

I am going to die horribly, ain't I?

___________  
I quickly found out that as an infant making plans to change the future was a useless endeavour. Not only was my tiny brain not equipped to deal with complex thought processes and immediately shutdown to sleep whenever I tried to push it, I also required more knowledge of this world (over what was described in Manga and anime). 

So, I postponed the plan making to my toddler years and decided to enjoy being a baby, which was more difficult than it sounded. I didn't care for breastfeeding and relieving myself in diapers, but suffered them with grace because of necessity. Furthermore, there were only so many times you could enjoy playing the Japanese version of peekaboo with your parents without getting bored. 

Along with that, my brother, who could not be more than a year to older than me, had decided to experiment on me, trying to find out how I would react if he poked me in different parts of my body with different amount of force. I had decided to just grumble a bit rather than to cry, as crying led me to becoming tired in a short while. It wasn't like I could escape, I was barely able to roll over. Shikaku would be surprised to find out later in life that normal babies don't just grumble when you poke them with your finger in the tummy.

My physical, mental and social limitations forced me to focus on the previously absent aspect of my life- chakra. For someone who had lived for more than 30 years without a lick of chakra, it was pretty obvious to me when I knew what I had to look for. It was like liquid energy present beneath my skin. Once I was aware of it, I found it impossible to ignore. With the knowledge that chakra was going to be an essential asset to my future, I decided to start early with chakra manipulation.

I knew about the leaf sticking exercise and therefore spent a week trying to make my baby blanket stick to my hand. It turned out that the trick was to basically gather all the chakra I had in my body and release it from my palm. Following my success I fell asleep and didn't see anything wrong with that, since randomly falling asleep was what I did now. But waking up to see the worried faces of my parents in what could only be a hospital room, I decided to be a bit more conservative with my chakra training.

Obviously, being baby I had very small amount of chakra, which led to the previous episode of chakra exhaustion. I knew that constantly using up my chakra was one way to gain reserves but I didn't want to trouble my parents with any more comas. Therefore, using my innovative mind, I came up with a plan to use chakra without exhausting it.

It basically consisted of using my anatomy knowledge to imagine all arteries and veins in my body filled with chakra and then I willed my chakra to travel along this pathways like blood did. After a few days I got the hang of it. This way the energy was just circulating inside my body and was not wasted, thus conserved. I was learning to control chakra and was increasing my reserves (and as I noticed a few days later, also my muscle strength) without side effect of chakra exhaustion.

I wanted to declare myself a genius for this innovation but decided to consider this boon for what it was and not get cocky. This was probably the first hurdle I had crossed in a very long obstacle race.

_______________

My toddler years weren't very interesting except that I finally got used to being Nara Mishika, daughter of Nara Himiko and Nara Shota and little sister and experimental subject of Nara Shikaku. I also slowly strengthened my grasp on japanese, both written and oral, something that wasn't one of my strong points in my past life. It was wonderful how plastic a child's brain was. Combining that with an already developed psyche, learning a new language was child's play, literally.

I was four years old when a major change was introduced to my routine, which by then included reading, playing with Shikaku, chakra training (still a secret), lessons with mother and physical excercise with Shikaku (which would probably progress to taijutsu training). Apparently, Uzumaki Kushina had been brought to Konoha from her home island of Uzushio and she was in need of a playmate. As I was nearest to her age among the clan children, my father volunteered me for the task.

I was very excited to meet the toddler version of Naruto's mother but it turned out to be a major letdown. She was a whiny brat and didn't even come out of the room to greet me. I could sort of empathise with her. She had been sent away from her home and family to a strange village to a life of uncertainty and danger, sort of like me. Except, unlike me, she was an actual 4 year old.

I gave up trying to befriend her when she didn't answer after 15 minutes of knocking and coaxing and resigned myself to return home, when Mito-sama, a lady who had enough grace in her pinky finger that I had in my whole body, who was also Kushina's gaurdian, asked me to stay for tea.

I agreed without thinking about the implications and subsequently fumbled my way around the traditional Japanese tea ceremony. I was positive that I had made pretty big blunders, but Mito-sama was kind enough to ignore them, until the end that is.

"Mishika-chan, you should pay more attention to your tea ceremony lessons. They are as important for a kunoichi as chakra training, and definitely more important than unauthorised chakra training."

I was about to apologise for my atrocious manners during the ceremony when I caught the last part. "I'm not sure what you're talking about, Mito-sama." I am not proud to say that I froze.

She gave me an exacerbated look. "Uzumaki's are very good at chakra sensing. I can sense you circulating your chakra at this moment."

I quickly stopped the self made chakra control excercise which had become second nature for me, and tried to think of a plausible excuse.

"Oh, that is very good chakra control. Fairly impossible to achieve at four years of age." She remarked. "Especially for a Nara."

"What do you mean by that?" I bristled, apparently having developed a sense of pride for my clan, which I had been previously unaware of.

"Nara's do not start their children's chakra training until they are six. Which means you've been training on your own. You've been fairly lucky till now but chakra training is dangerous. There's a reason it is not done without supervision."

"But.."

"Don't worry." She interupted me. "I won't tell your parents. I have a condition, though."

"What condition?" I asked warily.

"You have to come here every day to learn new chakra control excercises."

"What?"

"You have the best chakra control I've observed except for my granddaughter. It would be foolish to leave you to fumble on your own and potentially cripple yourself." Mito-sama stated, matter-of-factly.

And that was how I gained my first sensei.

________________

My acquaintance and random lessons in chakra control with Uzumaki Mito gradually turned into an apprenticeship in fuinjutsu. I had been very enthusiastic in my agreement when she had asked me if I wanted to learn basic sealing, knowing I had to grab anything that could give me an advantage in the ninja world. Fuinjutsu did not come as easily to me as controlling chakra did, but I was greatly benefited by having a competent teacher and knowledge of calculus from my past life.

Even with those advantages, after six months I was barely able to match a novice from Uzushio. Kushina, when she had got out of her slump, mercilessly teased me for my supposed incompetence. However, Mito-sama assured me that I was making good progress, especially for a non-Uzumaki. She told me that with my chakra control I would be much deadlier on the battlefield than a standard seal expert, because of me being able to use chakra to apply seals, even if I didn't master fuinjutsu to the Uzumaki level. I couldn't wait for the day I would be able to do that.

Despite spending long hours with Mito working on chakra control and fuinjutsu, I did not slack off in clan training with Shikaku. It started with basic physical conditioning and shuriken and kunai handling. Normally, a Nara child is supposed to start training at 6, but I was able to whine my way into Shikaku's lessons, with whom my relationship had developed further. I was more like a twin to him than a younger sister. He never got offended when I learnt something earlier than he did as he shared a typical laid back attitude with most of the Nara clan.

Nara excelled at shadow manipulation because of their chakra normally had a very small yang element compared to yin element, which they had in spades became of their genius level intellect. I, on the other hand, had a very large reservoir of yin chakra even for a Nara, courtesy of my previous life. That, along with my supernatural chakra control, led me to be able to control shadows without any hand seals when tou-san finally taught it to us.

While, I was busy dreaming up ways to make that useful, tou-san looked less than pleased with my achievement. 

He took me to the clan council that evening where I was told the story of Nara Shikane, who was the clan head about 200 years ago. She was a prodigy at shadow manipulation and was able to manipulate shadow just by thought. Over the time, the shadows became a part of her luring her away from the physical world. She was the most powerful kunoichi of the Nara clan but committed suicide at 20.

I couldn't suppress shivers when elder Shoto ended the story. 

That was certainly an effective way to ensure that I wouldn't go overboard with the shadow manipulation technique.


	2. Chapter 2

As a general rule, the Nara clan sent it's children to the ninja academy at six years of age. It coincided with the age they usually started their chakra training and academy added as a good supplementary training. I, however, neither had any plans to wait another year nor to be seperated from Shikaku.

Both early admission in the academy and early graduation were normally discouraged by the Nara because they believed that children younger than ten weren't equipped to deal with realities of war and ninja life. My situation, though, was a bit different. My parents had always been aware of my higher maturity and having much more energy than an average Nara. Therefore, they didn't put up too much resistance when I requested to join the academy a year earlier.

Or that was what I thought. They could have a completely different complex reason that I couldn't make heads or tails of. They were geniuses after all.

On the first day of the academy, Shikaku and I decided not to stay together, but to be with our respective friends. Shikaku stayed with Chouza and Inoichi (he got along much better with them than I did at our combined clan gatherings and since, he was the heir, he basically had to keep up the alliances); while I went to Kushina.

Kushina and I weren't exactly friends, in the general sense of the word. She was too much of a brat for me too consider her an equal companion, but we had a sort of understanding with each other based on common grounds. She had taken a getting used to but eventually her abrasiveness and hyperactivity started to appear charming. Besides, there was still the novelty of being acquaintances with Naruto's mom. I had no difficulty in spotting where Naruto got his knuckleheadedness from.

Minato, though, was the exact opposite. I spotted him early, during the opening ceremony. The sunshine blonde hair was was a dead give away. He was among a group of children from the orphanage, looking very excited, his blue eyes shining with determination.

"Do you like that guy?" Kushina 'whispered' to me, loud enough to be heard two meters away.

I look at her annoyed, "I am five."

"So?" She challenged. "You were looking at him for a long time time and you had that sappy expression on your face, same one grandma has when she's talking about grandpa."

"I did not." I retorted angrily.

"Did too." Came the childish reply.

"Will you shut up, tomato?" I hissed, regretting it instantly as Kushina went red with rage and pounced on me.

Ten minutes later we were seperated by an irate chunnin-sensei, and I was the one that was worse for the wear. Kushina had immense stamina and an effective brawler style. It could be a while when I'd be able to win physical fights against her.

Shikaku came to help me, looking amused. "Really, first day of the academy and you start a public brawl against the whirlpool princess. And mom and dad think you're mature?"

"Excuse me? I didn't start anything. Your 'princess' did." I huffed.

"There are rumours that you were fighting over that blonde haired kid." Shikaku told me.

I raised my eyebrows at that. "Really Shika, I'm five."

"Well, you were staring at him." He teased, obviously amused at my discomfort. "Look he's coming here."

I looked around to see Minato still chatting with his friends. Shikaku was smirking when I turned back to scowl at him.

Aside from the rumours about my crush on Minato, academy was going well. Kushina and I made up, both of us apologizing to each other in the evening at Mito-sama's behest.

I helped Kushina learn kunai handling as I was already taught that by my father. Though, it turned out that knowing how to properly hold a kunai didn't help a bit in getting the kunai to the targets, which were pretty far away. Even using all my strength I couldn't get them to more than three-fourths of the way. Even the orphans with only sub-par academy instructions were throwing better than me.

Thankfully, Kushina was almost as bad as me. She could throw hard enough, just not right at the targets. Her kunai flew in all the directions, even in the one opposite of the target. She shined in taijutsu, though. Her brawler style surprising and took out her opponent before they had any chance to counter her. My area of expertise turned out to be academics and chakra studies, prompting Kushina to gift me with the nickname 'nerd'.

"This is so annoying. Why can't I hit the target?" I whined. "Shika, help me?"

"Troublesome." He mumbled, as he cloud watched, lying on the grass. "Aren't you supposed to be good at this stuff?"

"Just because I'm good at some things doesn't mean I'm going to be good at everything." I huffed. "Now come here and tell me what I am doing wrong?"

Shikaku sighed as if I had asked him for a great sacrifice, and walked over to me. "Fine, show me." He yawned.

I did.

"Are you using chakra?" He asked.

"Chakra? For what?" I inquired.

"To reinforce your muscles."

"We're supposed to do that?" That was supposed to be pretty advanced for someone who's not a chakra prodigy, like Tsunade. Academy students were expected to do that?

"Not to the level you're thinking of. People do that subconsciously."

"No, they don't." I countered.

"I meant normal people who don't control every lick of chakra in their body all the time." He added.

"Oh."

"Yeah. Now, if you don't mind, I'm taking a nap."

The next day I asked Mito-sama to teach me how to reinforce my muscles. If I wasn't doing it subconsciously, I had to learn to do it intentionally. She was Tsunade's grandmother, she would know how to do that.

Turns out that she did, and even agreed to teach me, if I convinced my parents to let me be her apprentice.

"No." Nara Shota replied.

"But..."

"No."

"Otou-san.."

"No."

"At least, listen to me." I shouted in frustration.

"Mishika-chan, do you even understand the implications of this? It would basically make you a part of her family- both Uzumaki and Senju clan. Do you know how big of a target that will paint over your back?" My father asked, sounding frustrated.

"I'm willing to risk it." I replied.

"You don't know what you're talking about." I had rarely seen my father get angry. This was one of those rare times.

"You're right, I don't. However, being a ninja would also paint a target on my back and so would being the daughter of the Nara clan head. This apprenticeship would give me the tools to survive, even if it does make me a bigger target. I promise to work hard enough that the benifits would be much more than the disadvantages." I responded.

I watched as father stared impassively at me for almost a minute before sighing, and giving in.

I ran to the Senju compound with the signed contract papers.

I took me a few days to learn the chakra reinforcement technique, and the results were phenomenal. My kunai no longer stopped short if the targets but got embedded deeply into the wood. I wasn't perfectly accurate but accepted that it would come with time and practice. My strength lied in other areas.

For instance, taijutsu. I still didn't have enough control to use it on other children, but punching the ground to form cracks was usually intimidating enough for my opponent to surrender. I knew it wasn't good for my growth to avoid spars, but I wanted to wait until I got the technique down. I knew the other party would be using chakra, albeit subconsciously and with much less precision, and with me fighting without it, I would be sure to lose.

I didn't know if it was me being petty, but I definitely didn't want to lose to a bunch of children. The humiliation at the target practice had been more than enough.

Unfortunately, my stint of victories by intimidation didn't last. It was Minato who called my bluff by attacking me as soon as the spar started. He was skilled as well fast. I didn't stand a chance when all I could do was increase my speed by chakra and dodge faster. Soon, he had me pinned to the ground, face down with both arms behind my back. I had no choice but to surrender.

As if that wasn't bad enough, Kushina had to 'whisper', "So, how'd it feel to get pinned by him, nerd?"

"Oh my god. What is wrong with you, tomato?" I shouted.

Hearing that hated nickname, Kushina wasted no time in attacking me, even resorting to using her teeth. I didn't hold back either. I might have chakra in a punch or two, but Kushina was tough, she could take it.

This time, Mito-sama made us clean the entire Senju compound.


	3. Chapter 3

Despite popular opinion, I did not have a crush on Namikaze Minato, the reason being that I was not a pedophile. I just admired him for his intelligence and work ethic. He managed to become the Fourth Hokage while being an orphan with no bloodlines. His mastery over fuinjutsu (a subject I was still struggling with) was so great that he managed to recreate the second Hokage's flying thunder god technique and was able to seal the strongest bijuu in a baby without any previous preparation or the advantage of mokuton.

I wondered how much better he would be if he recieved teachings from an actual Uzumaki instead of Jiraiya.

"Mito-sensei, how do you feel about taking another student?" I asked while practicing speed writing kanji (an essential skill of a seal master, according to my teacher).

Mito-sensei hummed. "I would not be averse to the idea, if I find someone worthy. Why? Did you have someone in mind, Mishika-chan?"

"There's a boy in our class. He's kind of like a genius. I think he'd be really good at fuinjutsu." I answered. "He's not a clan child, still he's at the top of the class."

"Oh? Is it that Minato boy Kushina was telling me about?" Mito-sensei's voice took up a teasing tone.

"Whatever Kushina has told you about him is a lie because Kushina is a lying liar who lies." I was momentarily shocked by my childish outburst that I had to take a few seconds to recompose myself, while Mito-sensei giggled. "I meant that Kushina has been misunderstanding the situation, Mito-sensei." I continued after clearing my throat.

"Of course." She agreed, somberly. "You can bring him to the compound after classes. I'll assess him to see if he has any potential to learn fuinjutsu."

"Thank you." I replied, smiling gratefully. "You will not regret it."

My decision to get Minato to the sealing lessons wasn't completely altruistic. Even though I didn't have a crush on him, I wished to become friends with him. For one, he was infinitely more mature than the other children my age and I couldn't just rely on Shikaku for any intelligent conversation. Secondly, he was a natural genius in almost all the shinobi arts. Training with him would benifit me by setting a higher bar, ultimately leading me become a more skilled shinobi.

Kushina, however, took this as a confirmation of her being right all along.

"Baa-chan said you wanted to bring Minato to the sealing lessons." She asked, sitting dawn on the desk next to me, smirking.

"I did." I answered as indifferently as I could.

"Ha, I knew it." She shouted and fist bumped into the air.

"Kushina, I just want to be his friend. It's nothing untoward." I said, asking whatever god was out there to get that girl's mind out of romance. To my surprise, Kushina didn't follow up her proclamation with any more lewd comments. Instead, she was looking at me contemplatively.

"What?" I asked, suddenly afraid. Surely, no good would come out of a contemplative Kushina.

"I'm not going to tease you anymore." She declared.

"Why?" I said, reflexively. "Not that I want you to tease me. I'm just curious as to what changed your mind."

She scowled. "Baa-chan asked me to. She said that you were shy. And I was only teasing you because you lied to me when I asked you about him the first time. Now you admitted to wanting to be his friend. That is good enough for me, I suppose."

I knew that if I didn't clear this up right away, this was going to cause problems in future. But I was so relieved that she wasn't going to tease me anymore, that I decided to take anything I was getting.

Inviting Minato turned out to be a bit trickier.

"Namikaze-san." I called out as I saw the blonde leaving the classroom, ignoring the giggling around me.

He turned around and turned red as he spotted me. "Aah, Nara-san. How may I help you?" He asked, stammering.

Uh oh.

"Look kid, I don't care what Kushina has been spreading, I don't have a crush on you." I snapped at his blushing face.

That brought him up short. "You don't?" He asked, his face returning to normal. "Wait, did you just call me a kid? Aren't you a year younger than me?"

"I'm older in soul." I told him the truth. "Look, I wanted to ask if you wished to attend some sealing classes with Kushina and me. Uzumaki Mito is our sensei."

"Really? Mito-sama?" His blue eyes actually started glowing. "Of course, I am honoured to be given a chance to attend. Thank you so much for inviting me, Nara-san."

"Call me Mishika. Less chances of mixing up with Shikaku." I offered.

"Mishika-san. Please call me Minato then." He bowed, making me feel bad that an actual orphan and child had better manners than me.

That was when my brother, as if summoned by his name, appeared. "What's going on here?" He asked, crossing his arms, trying to appear stern. Given that he was a seven year old chibi, it looked more cute than intimidating.

"Ah, Nara-san. Mishika-san invited me to her sealing classes. I was merely thanking her." Minato answered, beaming. Okay, maybe he was a bit less inteligent than I was giving him credit for.

Shikaku's frown deepened.

"Oh, calm down, nii-chan. Minato likes Kushina, not me." I blurted out, before realising that I had no way of knowing that.

"Wha... Wait, how did you know?" Minato flailed, as Shikaku relaxed back to his lazy slouch. God, save me from brothers.

"It's kind of obvious." I answered Minato, lying through my teeth. I had never seen him around Kushina.

"Oh no. Does Kushina-san know too?" He asked nervously.

"Umm...no. If you haven't noticed yet, she's kind of dense."

Minato frowned at that. "That's not a nice thing to say."

"It's true, though." I shrugged.

"Kushina-san is talented in other areas. She is so spirited and determined..." He began.

"Okay. Maybe I can hear all about Kushina's great qualities some other time. We have to go to the Senju compound now. Mito-sensei doesn't like it when we're late."

"Yosh." Minato's grin was back. "Let's learn some sealing."

* * *

Just as I had predicted, Minato excelled in the fuinjutsu lessons. According to Mito-sensei, his instictive grasp of the subject was rare even amongst the Uzumaki's. It hard not being jealous, but somehow I managed. I knew what I was getting into when I invited him. I helped that be was humble and actually helped me understand some concepts that the Uzumaki somehow weren't able to explain due to their weirdly wired brains.

Kushina, however, was less than gracious on being beaten, on what was essentially her clan art, by some non-Uzumaki. Apparently, she was only okay with me (if that was her being okay), because, according to her 'I sucked'.

This caused Minato to underperforming intentionally, leading to him getting a lecture by Mito-sensei on treating the sealing arts with the respect they deserved. He never tried underperforming again.

"Couldn't you have picked someone better?" Kushina whined. "He's such a sissy. There's Inoichi if you're interested in girly blonde boys. He's even friends with your brother." She offered eagerly.

"No, thank you." I answered, repeating my kata while standing on the water in a pond in the Senju compound.

Kushina looked on jealously. "How is your chakra control that good? I can't even get the leaf to stick to my forehead. Even genius blondy isn't as good as you."

I didn't stop the smirk forming in my lips on hearing that. Minato might be the top of class rankings and better at fuinjutsu, but there was no way that we could surpass me in chakra control.

"It's just practice." I told Kushina, half truthfully. "Mito-sensei said she'll start teaching me the strength of hundred seals if I mastered this." I had already completed the chakra augmentation technique to increase strength. It wasn't to Tsunade's level but I got me many wins in taijutsu sparring untill sensei barred it classifying it as a ninjutsu technique, since it involved controlled use of chakra. I was back to losing since I couldn't use the sub-par instinctive chakra augmentation like other kids.

"What would the hundred what's it seal do? I would still kick your ass at taijutsu, like I do at sealing." Kushina teased, rubbing salt into the wound.

"You'll have to be satisfied with that, since you're never going to beating Minato." I teased back.

Kushina scoffed. "What does that matter? Your boyfriend isn't coming between our rivalry."

"He's not my boyfriend." I replied automatically.

"Sure." She replied. "Are you done with that? I want to spar, all out."

"The last time we did that, Mito-sensei made us clean the compound. And, no I'm not done. I've to do this for an hour."

"Boring!" She left in a huff.

I continued doing my kata and after a while almost entered a trance, feeling my own chakra and the chakra around moving, all the while balancing on the water. After the last kata, my opened my eyes, only for my concentration to be broken by a flash of bright blonde hair. I only barely managed to avoid falling into the pond.

"Wow, that was amazing." One Namikaze Minato praised, after almost ruining the entire excercise. I resisted to scold him after seeing his earnest and awed expression.

"What are you doing here, Minato?" I asked, walking off the pond.

"Oh, Mito-sensei sent me get you." Of course she did, probably as some kind of test. "When did you learn to do that?"

"Doing what? Water walking?"

"No, though that was impressive too. I meant making the chakra in the air glow like that." Minato said, stopping in my tracks.

"Doing what?"

"Oh, I guess you weren't aware you were doing that. It was pretty cool through." He said. "Listen, I've got to run to the orphanage before lights out. Tell me tomorrow if you figure it out, won't you?"

I nodded distractedly. 'The chakra in the air', did he mean nature chakra? Was I manipulating nature chakra?

"Mishika-chan, Did you complete the excercise?" Mito-sensei asked as I entered the main house.

"Yes, sensei." I answered, tabling the topic of nature chakra for the time being.

"Since, you aren't drenched to the bone, I suppose you are now ready to learn the strength of a hundred seals."

I nodded eagerly.

"Well, there is nothing much to it. You just have to send a small tendril of chakra to the empty gate on your forehead. It shouldn't be more than the chakra required to make chakra string. The gate would store chakra and you would be able to release it during emergencies."

I waited for sensei to continue.

"That's all." She said when I kept on looking eagerly.

I felt my jaw drop. "What? What do you mean by 'that's all'?"

Mito-sensei sighed. "It's not a complicated technique once you have the required chakra control, Mishika-chan. The struggle is to reach the chakra control required. You have already done that."

"Oh." I said dumbly. "But what about 'the hundred seals'?"

"The technique was named such so as to discourage people from trying it on their own. Can you imagine if someone with Kushina's chakra control tried to send continuous chakra tendrils to their head?"

A gruesome image of an exploded head entered my mind. I flinched.

"Yes. I see that you can guess. Now can I trust you to not share this technique carelessly?" Sensei asked.

"Yes, sensei. You can trust me." I replied.

Mito-sensei smiled. "I know I can."


	4. Chapter 4

As we progressed to our third year in academy, and I turned seven, the tensions between the nations grew to a point that whispers of war started going round the village. I was aware that the Second Great Shinobi war occurred vaguely around the time Minato was a genin, so there was still year or two before shit hit the fan, unless of course, Minato had graduated early in the manga. Considering his grades, and the political situation, it wouldn't be that much of a stretch.

The approaching war had brought on a sense of urgency and maturity in the academy students. They didn't goof off anymore because they knew that their lives would soon depend on what they learn at the academy. It felt wrong, seeing eight years old going into survival mode. Something was really wrong with the shinobi system that even children didn't feel safe enough to enjoy their childhoods.

It wasn't something I could change, though. What I could do was focus on getting stronger. Because this wasn't a world where the inteligent or charismatic people brought change, it was only the strongest who changed things. Look at Hashirama and Madara, the strongest shinobi of their generation or perhaps of all time. They were the ones that brought an end to the Warring Clan's Era. Granted their plans for peace didn't exactly work out, but it was still change. I had to get to their level if I intended to change things around here.

I was making good progress. The academy course in the third year had advanced to include ninjutsu, and I was the uncontested holder of the first rank in class in that department, despite Minato's faster hand seals. There was no way he could compete with me in ninjutsu when I knew my chakra inside out. With a few weeks of practice, I even managed to perform the Kawirami, Henge and Bunshin seallessly, making the speed of my hand signs obsolete. I understood that the academy three were E rank jutsu and there was no way that I'll be able to perform higher rankings jutsu seallessly, therefore I doubled down on the practice of hand seals. Shikaku got quite annoyed when I continued doing it whilst playing shofi with him.

It had been three years since I had started learning fuinjutsu. I was nowhere near Minato or Kushina's level, who were both capable of inventing seals, but I knew seals, quite a lot of them. I had understood early on thar fuinjutsu wasn't something I was going to excel in, therefore I had more time memorizing seals than I had learning how they worked. Mito-sama had seen what I was doing and didn't correct me, because, with my chakra control, I could become formidable with only those few memorized seals if I learnt to apply them on touch.

I took it a bit farther than that. With my natural talent at the shadow manipulation technique of the Nara clan, I started experimenting to apply seals through my shadows, which meant learning to channel chakra through the shadows. 

It had never been done before. The Nara had always used the shadows as an extension of their chakra but never went beyond that, perhaps because of the temptation of losing themselves in the shadows. But, despite outo-san's warning, I decided to give it a try. 

It was difficult, but because of having such a thorough understanding and control over my own chakra, I was able to distinguish between myself and the shadow. It was a thin line, all too easy to cross, if I wasn't careful in channeling the chakra through small pathways. It required meditation and further chakra control excercises, because even near perfect chakra control wasn't enough for it. It required absolutely perfect chakra control. It required hours and hours of work for weeks and months.

Meanwhile, the shadows were tempting. I understood how easy it would be to just lose control and let the shadow win my battles for me. The shadow was powerful, and more importantly it was everywhere. It would grant me the level of power I was hoping to achieve. If Outo-san hadn't warned me about the consequences, I might even have given in. But I knew that I needed the power for a purpose. It would be no use to lose myself to get power and forgot about the purpose. So, the slow and steady way it was.

It took a year and perfect chakra control to the decimal, but finally, I was able to channel chakra though my shadows. After that, it was the same principle as applying seals with hands.

There was a gleam in Mito-sama's eyes when I placed an explosive seal on a tree stump using my shadow. The old lady actually giggled when the stump exploded into a thousand pieces.

"I knew there was something special about you when I met you, Mishika-chan." She said, patting my shoulder. "It's nice to be proven right."

I won't deny that my heart swelled several sizes bigger at that compliment.

"You're worried about another war, aren't you?" She suddenly asked, scrutinizing me carefully.

"Yes." I admitted. "It seems inevitable now."

"Hmm. It broke Hashirama's heart when the War started between the ninja villages, after all he had done to prevent it. Especially, when the jinchuriki were used on the battlefield." She said, holding her hand over her stomach. "I had offered to fight for Konoha. Kyuubi is the strongest bijuu, after all."

I widened my eyes at an S rank secret spoken so casually.

"Oh, don't make that face. I know you've been aware of my status for quite a while. I don't know how but I've seen you look towards my stomach when I was explaining chakra containing seals." Mito-sama admonished. "Hashirama didn't let me fight. Tobirama provided me the same courtesy after his brother's death. Kushina-chan is to be my heir and she wouldn't have that privilege."

"She'd be a weapon." I agreed.

"Every shinobi is a weapon." Mito-sama corrected, gravelly. "She'd be a weapon of mass destruction. Don't let her be so, Mishika. The Kyuubi can only be controlled if you fill your heart with love. Don't let her be consumed by hate."

"I won't." I promised somberly, looking her in the eye.

Mito-sama smiled. "I knew I could count on you. I wish had more time with you, with all of you. You're such good children."

I wished I could say that she'd have a long time with us, but it'd be a lie. I knew that the time was coming. Mito-sama was old. It'd be foolish to wait for her natural death and risk the Kyuubi getting released, especially with war on the horizon. It wouldn't be long till the biju us transferred to Kushina leading to Mito-sama's death.

I felt moisture on my cheek and realised that I was crying. "How long?" I asked, my voice breaking.

"Not too long now. Perhaps another month. I've asked Tsunade to come back to Konoha and stay with me for a while." She sighed. "Nawaki would be happy to see her."

That was an understatement. Senju Nawaki's hero worship for his sister rivalled that of pre-massacre Sasuke. He hated me on principle because according to him I was copying his Nee-sama's techniques and I was allowed to do so because I wasn't awesome enough. He was a brat through and through, and he hadn't even started going to the academy yet.

"He wouldn't be happy when you're dead." I countered, bluntly.

"He'll be fine. The Senju are a resilient bunch. Besides, Tsunade will take care of him." Mito-sama replied.

"Tsunade won't have the time to take care of him when the war begins." I knew I was being stubborn. "Sensei, isn't there any way..."

"There isn't. Even if there was, it wouldn't do any good for me. I'm a very old woman, Mishika-chan, well past my prime. Do not grieve so much for me, especially when I'm still alive." She said, wiping my tears, gently. "Try to find a way for Kushina-chan with that big brain of yours, if you could."

I snorted, wetly. "You know I'm no good at fuinjutsu."

"I'm not asking you to use fuinjutsu, dear. I'm asking you to use your big brain. From what I've seen, you're very good at that."


End file.
